Schools falling short on educating young voters

Our democracy cannot survive without educating the next generation to their rights and responsibilities as citizens. Yet a new assessment of different states’ civics curricula suggests states are falling short on educating students on how government works, how the public engages in the public discussion and makes decisions and what a citizen’s role is in our nation.

Fewer states than five years ago offer a rigorous education in civics, only eight test what the students have learned and much of the course work focuses on history and policies rather than current events. Even those states that offer a fairly comprehensive curriculum, such as California, fall short when one drills down to see how the lessons would help young voters learn to frame and address community problems and work together to find solutions.

Also troubling is that civics courses — classes on U.S. History and American government — assume young Americans will dutiful embrace civic engagement (as have previous generations). What’s missing is an understanding how to engage young Americans in civics. Also that voting and the horse race of an election is but one tiny, tiny part of civic engagement.

Young people often will talk about the need in their lives to “make a difference.” We, as a nation, need to rethink how we are teaching them to engage in their community and make that difference. A nation of spectators is not a democracy.